A/N: Who knows what
inspired this one, but I have to thank everyone else who has written
a Colin fanfic because I've realized that few people have yet to
find their love for Colin. Or at least, they haven't expressed
their love by posting, which is quite depressing if you ask me. He's
a good character. Use it.

Disclaimer: Don't
own it. Nope. Nada.

Summary: In a moment
of weakness, Colin destroys his Harry collection…. A short,
feel-good bit about unexpected friends.

To Pick Up the
Pieces

In one swift angry
motion, the entire contents of Colin's collection were spattered
across his maroon bed sheets and toppling to the floor. Old
photographs of Harry walking to class, buying a new quill, and eating
a piece of toast lay amid strange artifacts such as dirty quidditch
socks (well, one dirty sock… Colin had lost the other one while
vacationing in Salisbury) and an old comb that Colin himself had
heroically retrieved from Harry's bathroom during a dare.

And now, gritting his
teeth in fury and tears in his eyes, he was fumbling for any piece of
Harry he could reach and ripping it to shreds. He was stamping on
Harry's old broom splinters and plucking apart his old quills. With
each motion, he heard their voices. The voices of Slytherins yelling
out at him in the corridors calling him queer and fag.
Colin's face grew hot and he pushed everything off of his bed in
one last huff just as someone opened the door to the dormitory and
shut it again, obviously annoyed.

Colin stood very still,
a feat considering his insides were jumping crazily. He heard the
person sigh from the other end of the room and felt his blood run
cold. The sigh was definitely not male.

For a moment, Colin
wondered if he should hide behind his bed until the girl went away
but then a horrible thought occurred to him. What if she wasn't
going to go away? What if she was waiting for someone? And then,
Colin would be stuck behind his bed hearing things he most certainly
did not want to be hearing with a stomach full of dinner. He
shivered.

Nope. Best to just nip
the gnome in the butt, as his father would always say.

"Err… Hello?"

The girl turned around
and Colin let out a silent breath of air. It was okay. She was at
least familiar and in the D.A. Party, or something was her name…

"Oh, hi." She said.
She did look a bit embarrassed. "I didn't mean to just run in
here or anything. It's just my friend, she's been getting on my
nerves a lot lately and I just sort of needed to get away from her as
fast as humanly possible."

She said this all very
quickly, but she did sound apologetic. She paused as recognition hit.
"Hey, you're the guy who collects all of Harry's stuff, right?
Colin, right?"

Colin tried not to look
disappointed, but his heart sank. He knew this conversation by heart
from here on out and he wasn't really up for the teasing right now.
He was just about to turn to leave the room when she continued, "I
have something for you."

This wasn't exactly
what he had been expecting. "What?" He asked.

"Remember the night
when Harry kissed Ginny after the Quidditch game?" She fished
through her bag for the something for Colin.

He nodded.

"Well," She said,
proudly drawing a round bottle cap from her purse, "I was on
cleanup crew. This was from his butterbeer that night."

"No, I just…"
What could he say? Just before you walked in I threw a hissy fit
and dismantled my famous collection with my bare hands?

Without really anything
to explain, he said the one thing he wanted to. "Thanks."

The girl smiled. She
looked pretty like that, with her hair tied back. "You've looked
kind of sad at the meetings lately. I figured you could use a
pick-me-up." She sighed and leaned against the wall and muttered
under her breath, "Merlin knows I could."

There was a silence at
the awkwardness of this. Two people of the opposite sex in a dorm
room… alone… in the near darkness…

"I didn't mean…"

"I know."

There was a silence
again.

"I should get going."
The girl said and touched his shoulder slightly with her purse. Colin
just stood there, running his fingers over the butterbeer cap and
feeling it under his skin. He wanted his collection back now, but in
a different way. He didn't want a stupid childish shrine to his
stupid childish hero. He wanted his collection back because… what
was he without it? But was it worth it? Was it worth it to live
through constant verbal battering because you looked up to Harry
Potter? "You shouldn't listen to them, Colin."

Her voice startled him.
She was looking at him from the door, holding her bag on her hip and
framed by the light outside.

"I know."

She smiled and started
to leave.

"Hey, Party?" Colin
said on some unknown burst of spontaneity.

Parvati turned and
quirked an eyebrow, but didn't say anything to the contrary.

"Thanks again."

"No problem Colin."

And Colin, butterbeer
cap in tow, wobbled back to his bedside to see if maybe this time he
had the strength to pick up the pieces.

A/N: Ta da. It
wasn't spectacular, I know, but I did feel like it was somewhat
satisfying.

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